Crosswalk the Devotional - July 31, 2009

July 31, 2009

A Divine Design 
by Laura MacCorkle, Crosswalk.com Senior Entertainment Editor

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 
Psalms 139:14, NIV

“I am a divine design… I am created in His image by God’s hand …”

These are some of the lyrics from a song I learned while at Pioneer Girls camp many, many summers ago when I was still young and impressionable. My best friend’s mother wrote the curriculum for our week-long Bible study that year, and it focused on the fact that we are all wonderful creations—made exactly as God has designed us to be.

It was a lesson from the Word that came at a perfect time, especially for young girls who were beginning to notice boys and the fact that our attractiveness by the opposite sex was determined by certain factors—mostly outlandish ideals and unachievable expectations—that we couldn’t really control.

I was already feeling unattractive by that time in my life. Like many young girls, I wore glasses. Yes, they were great in that they helped me to see the blackboards, the maps of the world and my teachers who were standing at the front of the classrooms. But, they weren’t so great in that they made me feel ugly and undesirable. Especially in junior high and my first year of high school (during which time I also had braces—a double-whammy for a gal’s image). 

But the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of high school, I was allowed to get my first set of contacts. Freedom! How I had so looked forward to this time in my life! No more glasses, and finally I wouldn’t be overlooked anymore and might begin to feel pretty.

And I did. For a while. But in college and for most of my 20s, I got sucked back into the vortex and continued to struggle with image and comparisons. Thankfully, in my 30s, I finally started to get it and realized that it was an insult to my Creator when I rejected myself, his carefully designed creation. What matters most is my inner beauty and that will always overshadow anything external.

While I still struggle somewhat with appearance, these days I feel like the battle is more with character issues and mindset. God, why did you make my mouth big enough for my foot to fit in there? Why am I constantly complaining? Isn’t there an over-the-counter medicine for oral dysentery? Why am I never content? Why am I so quick to judge? Why can’t I be as godly as her? And so forth.

But you know what? All of this—my struggles, my desires, my thoughts, my dreams—is part of God’s divine design of ME! I am created in God’s image. A masterpiece in the making. Purposeful cracks and all.

Now I’m sure my friends and family would tell you that they have “thankful hearts” over the fact that the mold was broken after I was made. And we’re ALL glad that the Designer is not done with me yet. He’ll be molding and shaping and using his tools to cut in here and cut away there until I go home to be with Him in heaven one day.

When I think of how God cares about me so much that He still takes time to work in my life so that I will be more like Him, it brings me to tears. He hasn’t thrown his hands up in “artistic disgust” and walked away from this lump of clay. 

He is constant and remains unchanged so that I may be changed. Thanks be to God!

Intersecting Faith & Life: Are you struggling with something about yourself that you just don’t like?  If this is something that cannot be changed, know that the Lord can still use you JUST as you are.  But if he is prodding you to make some adjustments in your character, seek his direction and know that he can move mountains and conform you into his image.

Further Reading

Genesis 1:27
Your Divine Design